The Jerusalem Post reports today that Israel’s military has ordered its Southern Command to prepare for a “large scale” invasion of the Gaza Strip, likely to begin within the next few months.

The revelation is hardly a surprise, as Israeli Military Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz has repeatedly pressed for an invasion of the Gaza Strip over the past few months, while trumpeting the late 2008 invasion as a “great success.”

Officials today indicated that the next invasion would be very much on the same model as 2008, which saw massive Palestinian civilian casualties and destruction of considerable civilian infrastructure, much of which remains unrepaired as an Israeli blockade has prevented construction materials from being imported.

Israeli officials cited “increased weaponry” in the Gaza Strip as the reason for the upcoming invasion, particularly anti-tank weapons. Other than getting some of their tanks blown up, it isn’t clear why they consider this a good reason to invade, as weapons have been flooding much of the region since the Libyan regime fell and their weapons warehouses were looted.

The exact timing of the invasion will also be tricky, as Israel will of course rely on the US to run interference in the UN when the ugliest aspects of the war begin to trickle out. The last invasion came after the 2008 US Presidential election but was virtually wrapped up before President Obama took office. It may be that Israel will try a similar strategy of starting the war after the vote in an effort to keep it from being a political issue in the US.

Source.

In announcing his intention to visit the Gaza Strip, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish prime minister, has raised the stakes in an ongoing crisis with Israel, observers say.

Quoting unnamed foreign ministry sources in Ankara, the Turkish daily Radikal reported yesterday that Turkish diplomats had told their Israeli counterparts they expected an Israeli apology for the death of nine Turkish activists during a raid on a flotilla of ships carrying aid for Gaza last year by July 27.

That day, a panel of the United Nations is expected to publish its report on the Israeli raid. In case Israel does not issue an apology before that date, Turkish-Israeli relations could sink even deeper into crisis, Radikal said. “If Israel apologises, [Mr Erdogan's] Gaza trip will not take place,” the paper reported. There was no official comment on the newspaper story.

Mr Erdogan told reporters on Tuesday that he intended to visit the Gaza Strip after a visit to Egypt, which is expected to take place next month. He said the Turkish foreign ministry was looking into arranging the Gaza trip.

Celalettin Yavuz, the deputy director of the Turkish Centre for International Relations and Strategic Analysis, a think tank in Ankara, said Mr Erdogan’s announcement stood for a new, tougher style of foreign policy. By entering Gaza from Egypt, Mr Erdogan would in effect break the Israeli blockade of the area, Mr Yavuz said by telephone yesterday.

“Either Israel apologises by July 27 and Erdogan will not go to Gaza via Israel, or Israel does not apologise, and then tensions will rise further,” Mr Yavuz said. “It is too early to tell what will happen.”

He said Mr Erdogan’s government had concluded that Turkey’s foreign-policy approach of recent years, which sought to address international problems like the Cyprus conflict with “goodwill”, had failed to produce tangible results. That is why Mr Erdogan had started to follow a tougher line.

Earlier this week, the Turkish prime minister ruled out further Turkish concessions to overcome the division of Cyprus, even though the conflict on the Mediterranean island has slowed down Turkey’s bid to join the European Union. Mr Erdogan also said Turkey would freeze relations with the EU during the second half of next year, when the Greek republic of Cyprus will hold the bloc’s rotating presidency. Last week, Mr Erdogan refused to meet Stefan Fule, the EU’s enlargement commissioner.

In the case of Israel, Mr Erdogan was aware that a confrontational style benefited him both domestically and among many governments in the Middle East, Mr Yavuz said. “Every now and then, he plays this card.” But too much public pressure on Israel carried the risk of making an Israeli apology less likely, Mr Yavuz added.

Mr Erdogan’s announcement of his planned visit to Gaza came at a time when Turkish diplomats were expressing optimism about a solution of the row.

“I would be surprised if there were no apologies since both sides have the political will to resolve this crisis,” ambassador Ozdem Sanberk, a Turkish member of the UN panel probing the Israeli raid, said earlier this week, according to the Agence France-Presse news agency. “We are heading toward a solution probably toward the end of the month.”

Israeli officials, including the foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, have said publicly that Israel will not apologise. But Israeli officials also acknowledge that upgrading relations with Ankara was a high diplomatic priority and that Israel would benefit from a return to the close ties the countries had before a series of crises that started with Israel’s military operation in Gaza in late 2008.

Turkey showed its willingness to improve ties with Israel by putting pressure on a controversial aid organisation in Istanbul not to take part in this year’s second Gaza flotilla. As a result, the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief, or IHH, pulled out of the project last month.

On Tuesday, Israeli forces intercepted a French ship heading for Gaza. Fifteen passengers, along with an Israeli journalist, on board the Dignity Al Karama were arrested and were to be deported yesterday.

Source.

A grim report from Russian Navy Commander-in-Chief Admiral Vladimir Vysotsky who is currently overseeing the Northern Banner Fleets participation in the American-led FRUKUS 2011 and “Mailed Fist” war operations off the US East Coast states that both President Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin have secretly agreed to allow the US invasion of Saudi Arabia that many believe is planned for later this summer.

According to Vysotsky’s report, Medvedev and Putin were reported in a “rage” after Federal Security Forces (FSB) linked the 20 June bombing in Petrozavodsk of a Tupolev-134 plane carrying 5 top nuclear experts to American C-4 explosives provided to Chechnya Muslim rebels by Saudi Arabia’s General Intelligence Presidency (GIP).

The Russian atomic experts killed in this attack included lead designers Sergei Rizhov, Gennadi Benyok, Nicolai Tronov and Russia’s top nuclear technological expert, Andrei Tropinov, all of whom worked at Iran’s Bushehr Nuclear Plant after the contract for the plant’s construction passed from the German Siemens company to Russian hands.

Even with the catastrophic loss of these top nuclear experts, however, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov announced on Monday that the Bushehr Nuclear Plant will begin operations in early August, and which the Saudis greatly fear due to Iran’s being able to manufacture atomic bombs once this project is complete.

As we have reported on many times, including our 28 May report “Obama Vows War On Saudi Arabia, Orders Thousands Of US Troops To Region” and our 23 June report “Nuclear Attack On US Warned Imminent As Saudi War Nears,” the Muslim Shiite supporting American President Barack Obama has continued the United States policy begun under former President George W. Bush calling for the strategic realignment of their Middle Eastern interests from the brutal Saudi Regime towards Persian Iran. [Note: Our 2 reports linked here should be read for their vital context to this report.]

The reason(s) for the US shifting their long-standing policy of supporting brutal Muslim-Arab regimes has led to what many are calling the “Arab Spring”, but can be more accurately described as an American led effort to destabilize and destroy all Middle Eastern and Northern African countries in order to secure their vast oil and natural gas resources for themselves.

The Arab Spring (literally the Arabic Rebellions or the Arab Revolutions) is a revolutionary wave of demonstrations and protests that has been taking place in the Arab world since 18 December 2010. Prior to this period, Sudan was the only Arab country to have successfully overthrown dictatorial regimes, in 1964 and again in 1985.

To date, there have been revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt; a civil war in Libya; civil uprisings in Bahrain, Syria, and Yemen; major protests in Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco, and Oman, as well as on the borders of Israel; and minor protests in Kuwait, Lebanon, Mauritania, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Western Sahara.

The enmity currently existing between the Saudis and the US stems from many factors, including the American rejection of their proposal to form a comprehensive Arab force, together with the US and NATO, to destroy Hezbollah in Lebanon, and both Bush and Obama protecting Iran from attack by either Saudi or Israeli forces.

The shifting of the US from alliances with Sunni Muslim regimes to that of Shiite Persian Iran is based on many factors, one of the most important articulated recently by Seyed Mohammad Sadeq Kharrazi, Iran’s Former Ambassador to France and the United Nations, who, in part, said:

“Revolution in Iran as the most prominent example of US mistakes in the Middle East and believe that absence of good understanding about various social strata in Iran caused the United States to lose a valuable opportunity such as Iran. They have used this point in their models and have also got their thinkers to study various models. Their studies have brought fruit in the past years and they are now well aware about what is good or what is bad in the region. The call by Mr. Obama on Israel to retreat behind 1967 borders is a direct outcome of those studies and American strategies. They have reached the conclusion that this strategy will be in the best interest of the United States.”

Important to note about the coming war between the US and Saudi Arabia is the increasing ties between the Saudi regime and Israel, both of whom know that should the Americans win their countries will be dissolved, and as we can, in part, read:

“The ties of the Al-Sauds to Tel Aviv have in recent years become increasingly visible and pervasive. This secret Israeli-Saudi alliance exists within the context of a broader Khaliji-Israeli alliance. The alliance with Israel is formed through strategic cooperation between the ruling families of Saudi Arabia and the Arab sheikhdoms in the Persian Gulf.

Together Israel and the Khaliji ruling families form a frontline for Washington and NATO against Iran and its regional allies. The alliance also acts on behalf of Washington to destabilize the region. The roots of chaos in Southwest Asia and North Africa are this Khaliji-Israeli alliance.

In line with the U.S. and the E.U., it is the alliance formed by Israel and the Khaliji rulers that has worked to create ethnic divisions between Arabs and Iranians, religious divisions between Muslims and Christians, and confessional divisions between Sunnis and Shiites. It is the “politics of division” or “fitna” that has also served to keep the Khaliji ruling families in power and Israel in its place. Israel and the Khaliji ruling families would not survive without the regional fitna.

The Al-Sauds and Tel Aviv are the authors of the Hamas-Fatah split and the estrangement of Gaza from the West Bank. They have worked together in the 2006 war against Lebanon with a view to crushing Hezbollah and its political allies. Saudi Arabia and Israel have also cooperated in spreading sectarianism and sectarian violence in Lebanon, Iraq, the Persian Gulf, Iran, and now Egypt.”

Equally important to note is the Saudi regimes spending of billions-of-dollars to undue the influence of the American led Arab revolutions, most notably in Egypt where this past week they refused to accept funds from either the International Monetary Fund or World Bank to keep their economy from collapse, but whose coffers have been filled, instead, by Saudi oil cash.

To the “end game” the Americans and their Western allies are steering their nations to was recently articulated by the American Pastor “of the elites” Lindsey Williams whose interview on the Alex Jones Show can be viewed at this LINK and is critically important for you to hear for yourself as World War III lies just around the corner.

Most astonishing in all of these events is the American peoples continued ignorance of them, but, perhaps, made somewhat explainable as this once free nation is now being described as a police state that the editorial writers at the New York Times this past week called their countries “new normal.”

© June 29, 2011 EU and US all rights reserved. Permission to use this report in its entirety is granted under the condition it is linked back to its original source at WhatDoesItMean.Com.

Travel.State.Gov - The Department of State warns U.S. citizens of the risks of traveling to Israel, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip, and about threats to themselves and to U.S. interests in those locations. The Department of State urges U.S. citizens to remain mindful of security factors when planning travel to Israel and the West Bank and to avoid all travel to the Gaza Strip. This replaces the Travel Warning issued August 10, 2010, to update information on the general security environment and to warn against participation in any attempt to reach Gaza by sea.

The Gaza Strip and Southern Israel

The Department of State strongly urges that U.S. citizens refrain from all travel to the Gaza Strip. This recommendation applies to all U.S. citizens. U.S. citizens should be aware that as a consequence of a longstanding prohibition on travel by U.S. citizen employees of the U.S. Government into the Gaza Strip, the ability of consular staff to offer timely assistance to U.S. citizens there is extremely limited, including the provision of routine consular services.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) strictly controls the crossing points between Israel and the Gaza Strip. The security environment within Gaza, including its border with Egypt and its seacoast, is dangerous and volatile. U.S. citizens are advised against traveling to Gaza by any means, including via sea. Previous attempts to enter Gaza by sea have been stopped by Israeli naval vessels and resulted in the injury, death, arrest, and deportation of U.S. citizens. U.S. citizens participating in any effort to reach Gaza by sea should understand that they may face arrest, prosecution, and deportation by the Government of Israel. The Government of Israel has announced its intention to seek ten-year travel bans to Israel for anyone participating in an attempt to enter Gaza by sea. On May 31, 2010, nine people were killed, including one U.S. citizen, in such an attempt. The U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv and the U.S. Consulate General in Jerusalem are not able to provide consular assistance in Gaza or on the high seas or coastal waters.

From December 27, 2008, through January 17, 2009, Israel conducted a military operation in Gaza. Israel and Hamas, a State Department-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization that violently seized power in Gaza in June 2007, declared separate truces to end the fighting. Small clashes continue to occur along the boundary of the Gaza Strip. Rockets and mortars are still fired into Israel from Gaza, and Israel continues to conduct military operations inside Gaza, including airstrikes. Israel has also declared an exclusion zone inside Gaza along its boundary with Israel and has taken lethal measures against individuals who enter it. The Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza is open, but it does not operate full time, and U.S. citizens are not always able to leave Gaza at a time of their choosing.

In the past, some rockets have traveled more than 40 km (24 miles) from Gaza and landed as far north as Yavne and Gadera and as far east as Beersheva. As a result of possible military operations by the Government of Israel in Gaza and the ever-present risk of rocket and mortar attacks into Israel from Gaza, U.S. government personnel travelling in the vicinity of the Gaza Strip boundary, to include the city of Sderot, require approval from the Embassy’s Regional Security Office. U.S. citizens in the area should be aware of the risks and should take note of announcements by the Government of Israel’s office of Homefront Command.

The West Bank

The Department of State urges U.S. citizens to exercise caution when traveling to the West Bank. Palestinian Authority (PA) security forces are now deployed in all major cities and other limited areas within the West Bank. As a result, violence in recent years has decreased markedly throughout the West Bank. Nonetheless, demonstrations and violent incidents can occur without warning. Vehicles have also been the target of rocks, Molotov cocktails and gunfire on West Bank roads. The IDF continues to carry out security operations in the West Bank. Israeli security operations, including incursions in Palestinian population centers, can occur at any time and lead to disturbances and violence. U.S. citizens can be caught in the middle of potentially dangerous situations. Some U.S. citizens involved in demonstrations in the West Bank have sustained serious injuries in confrontations with Israeli security forces. The State Department recommends that U.S. citizens, for their own safety, avoid demonstrations.

During periods of unrest, the Israeli Government sometimes closes off access to the West Bank and those areas may be placed under curfew. All persons in areas under curfew should remain indoors to avoid risking arrest or injury. U.S. citizens have been killed, seriously injured, or detained and deported as a result of encounters with Israeli operations in the West Bank. Travel restrictions may be imposed by Israel with little or no warning. Strict measures have frequently been imposed following terrorist actions, and the movement of PalestinianAmericans, both those with residency status in the West Bank or Gaza as well as foreign passport holders, has been severely impeded. Security conditions in the West Bank can hinder the ability of consular staff to offer timely assistance to U.S. citizens.

Jerusalem

The Department of State urges U.S. citizens to remain vigilant while traveling throughout Jerusalem, including in commercial and downtown areas of West Jerusalem. Spontaneous or planned protests within the Old City are possible, especially after Friday prayers. Some of these protests have led to violent clashes. Travelers should exercise caution at religious sites on holy days, Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Isolated street protests and demonstrations can also occur in areas of East Jerusalem, including around Salah Ed-Din Street, Damascus Gate, Silwan and the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood. U.S. Government employees are authorized to visit the Old City from 5:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., but not between 11:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m. on Fridays. The area of the ramparts on the city wall between Herod’s Gate and Lion’s Gate is off-limits to U.S. Government personnel at all times. The Sherover or Haas Promenade (scenic overlook) located in Armon Hanatziv is open to U.S. Government personnel during daylight hours only. Official personnel and their family members are prohibited from using public buses and bus terminals or stations.

Travel Restrictions for U.S. Government Personnel

Personal travel in the West Bank for U.S. Government personnel and their families is allowed for limited mission-approved purposes in the areas described below. They may travel to Bethlehem on weekends and holidays during daylight hours only and to Jericho on weekends and holidays; and transit through the West Bank using Routes 1 and 90 to reach the Allenby/King Hussein Bridge, or the Dead Sea coast near Ein Gedi and Masada. They also may travel north on Route 90 from the Allenby/King Hussein Bridge to the Sea of Galilee. Use of these routes is approved for transit purposes during daylight hours, with stops permitted only at roadside facilities on Highways 1 and 90. Personal travel also is permitted to Qumran National Park off Route 90 by the Dead Sea, and all areas south of Highway 1 and east of route 90 (Dead Sea area). Each transit requires prior notification to the Consulate General’s security office.

U.S. Government personnel and family members are permitted both official and personal travel on Route 443 between Modi’in and Jerusalem without prior notification between the hours of 5:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. only. All other personal travel in the West Bank, unless specifically authorized for mission-approved purposes, is prohibited.

General Safety and Security

Israeli authorities remain concerned about the continuing threat of terrorist attacks. U.S. citizens are cautioned that a greater danger may exist around restaurants, businesses, and other places associated with U.S. interests and/or located near U.S. official buildings, such as the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv and the U.S. Consulate General in Jerusalem. U.S. citizens are also urged to exercise a high degree of caution and to use common sense when patronizing restaurants, nightclubs, cafes, malls, places of worship, and theaters, especially during peak hours. Large crowds and public gatherings have been targeted by terrorists in the past and should be avoided to the extent practicable. U.S. Government personnel have been directed to avoid protests and demonstrations and urged to maintain a high level of vigilance and situational awareness at all times. U.S. citizens should take into consideration that public buses, and their respective terminals are “off-limits” to U.S. Governmentpersonnel.

Two U.S. citizens were murdered in separate incidents while walking in the woods in the Beit Shemesh area near Jerusalem in the last 18 months. Israeli authorities characterized the murders as terrorist attacks.

A bomb blast near the Central Bus Terminal in Jerusalem on March 23, 2011 injured several U.S. citizens.

In the Golan Heights and West Bank, there are live landmines in many areas and visitors should walk only on established roads or trails.

Press TV – Israel seeks to delegitimize the Palestinian Authority (PA) over its unity deal with Hamas in an attempt to prepare the ground to invade and occupy the West Bank, a political activist says.

“Israel is already making plans to utilize this (PA-Hamas unity deal) in order to delegitimize the PA and all it is going to take to that point is some sort of false-flag attack,” Mark Glenn with Crescent & Cross Solidarity Movement told Press TV.

On April 27, the Palestinian factions, Hamas and Fatah, issued a statement of understanding in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, agreeing to set up a transitional unity government and hold elections.

“Israel is going to have the case that she needs for a full-scale invasion of the West Bank, the way that she did against Gaza two years ago,” he pointed out.

Glenn argued that the new Israeli plan is aimed at “pushing the Palestinians out of the West Bank and creating this greater Israel that she has always strived for ever since her beginning.”

More than 1,400 Palestinians were killed during the three-week Israeli land, sea and air offensive in the Gaza Strip at the turn of 2009. The offensive also inflicted an estimated $1.6 billion in damages to the Gazan economy.

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been expelled from their homeland to the West Bank and Gaza Strip as well as countries in the region and worldwide since the ruthless Israeli invasion and occupation of Palestine in 1948.

Consequently, the Israeli regime began a massive campaign to urge Jews from all over the world to immigrate to the occupied Palestine, which they referred to as “the Jewish state.” The effort offered Jews from other countries a variety of incentives, including housing in settlement areas seized from local Palestinians.

Jews stole the land, they need to give it all back.

AP – Egypt will open its only crossing with the Gaza Strip this weekend, the Cairo military government announced Wednesday, significantly easing a four-year blockade on the Hamas-ruled territory but setting up a potential conflict with Israel.

Egypt’s official Middle East News Agency said the Rafah border crossing would be opened permanently starting Saturday from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day except Fridays and holidays.

This gives Gaza Palestinians a way to freely enter and exit their territory for the first time since 2007, when Hamas overran the territory, and Israel and Egypt closed the crossings.

Israel’s crossings are more significant, since they handle most cargo. A year ago Israel significantly eased its restrictions on cargo entering Gaza, but it still severely limits entry and exit of Gazans through its northern crossing into Israel.

MENA said the decision to open the Rafah crossing was part of efforts “to end the status of the Palestinian division and achieve national reconciliation.”

The statement said rules in effect before the blockade would be reinstated. At that time, European observers had a role in operating the crossing, and Israel monitored people and cargo to keep out militants and weapons.

Egypt’s Foreign Minister Nabil Elaraby told the Arab satellite channel Al-Jazeera late last month that the closure of Rafah crossing was about to end, calling the decision to close it “a disgusting matter.”

Gazans have circumvented the blockade by operating hundreds of smuggling tunnels under the 9-mile (15-kilometer) Gaza-Egypt border. The tunnels have been used to bring in all manner of products, as well as people.

Israel charges Hamas has used the tunnels to import weapons, including rockets that can reach main population centers in Israel’s center.

AP – Turkey on Saturday warned Israel against another act of bloodshed in international waters after activists announced plans to send a new aid flotilla to the blockaded Gaza Strip.

“It should be known that Turkey will give the necessary response to any repeated act of provocation by Israel on the high seas,” Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said in an interview on NTV television.

“Those who believe Turkey should take certain steps to stop (the new flotilla) must first warn Israel not to repeat the human tragedy it caused last year,” he said.

On May 31 last year, Israeli marines swarmed aboard the Turkish flagship of an international aid flotilla bound for Gaza, killing nine Turks in international waters and plunging ties with Ankara into deep crisis.

The Istanbul-based Islamist charity which had spearheaded the mission said Friday that a new convoy of ships would sail to Gaza in the last week of June.

Around 1,500 activists from more than 100 countries will take part in the convoy, organised by 22 civic groups, it said.

Asked whether Ankara had made any attempt to dissuade the group from the campaign, Davutoglu said: “We have never encouraged any convoy. We have shared our views about the safety of our citizens with all related parties. That was the case last year and it is not any different this time.”

The minister insisted however that his Islamist-rooted government “cannot give instructions to civil society” and that Israel’s “unlawful” blockade of Gaza lay at the core of the tensions.

He urged the United States and the international community to back a recent reconciliation deal between the radical Palestinian group Hamas, which controls Gaza, and the secular Fatah faction of Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas.

“If the division of the Palestinian authorities is healed, the conditions that serve as Israel’s justification for the blockade will be eradicated… and there will be no need for an aid convoy,” he told NTV.

Relations between one-time allies Turkey and Israel remain stuck in crisis after several fence-mending meetings over the past year failed to yield results.

Turkey, which has recalled its ambassador from Tel Aviv, insists that the Jewish state should apologise and compensate the victims’ families.

From Now Lebanon:

Al-Jazeera: Egyptian authorities announce ‘state of alert’ on all Sinai exits and entrances

Press TV – The UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in the Palestinian territories says Israel has killed 1,300 Palestinian children since 2000.

Richard Falk announced the figure during a press conference in the Jordanian capital city of Amman late on Monday, the Palestinian News Network reported on its website.

In his latest report, Falk noted that in 2010 alone, the Israeli army’s gunfire and shelling of the Gaza Strip claimed the lives of 17 children.

Israel has not responded to repeated calls by the UN Special Rapporteur for access to the occupied Palestinian territories.

Due to the prevailing security situation in Gaza, Falk was forced to cancel his visit to the Israeli-blockaded enclave — part of the mandate given to him by the Human Rights Council.

The United Nations says he will visit Gaza later in the year.

Since his appointment in May 2008, Falk has faced hindrances by the Israeli regime, which has refused to cooperate with the rapporteur in his field missions.

In mid-December 2008, Falk was denied entry into the occupied territories by Tel Aviv. He was detained, interrogated and subsequently deported.

The move occurred days before Tel Aviv launched a deadly onslaught against the populated coastal sliver on December 27. The 22-day offensive killed more than 1,400 Palestinians, mostly women and children, injured thousands of others, leveled hundreds of civilian homes and offices and devastated a great portion of the infrastructure in the impoverished territory.

Haar – Rafah’s opening would be a violation of an agreement reached in 2005 between the U.S., Israel, Egypt, and the EU; Israel official tells the Wall Street Journal developments in Egypt could affect Israel’s national security.

Chief of Staff of the Egyptian Armed Forces General Sami Anan warned Israel against interfering with Egypt’s plan to open the Rafah border crossing with Gaza on a permanent basis, saying it was not a matter of Israel’s concern, Army Radio reported on Saturday.

Egypt announced this week that it intended to permanently open the border crossing with Gaza within the next few days.

The announcement indicates a significant change in the policy on Gaza, which before Egypt’s uprising, was operated in conjunction with Israel. The opening of Rafah will allow the flow of people and goods in and out of Gaza without Israeli permission or supervision, which has not been the case up until now.

An Israeli official on Friday told The Wall Street Journal that Israel was troubled by the recent developments in Egypt saying they could affect Israel’s national security at a strategic level.

Israel’s blockade on Gaza has been a policy used in conjunction with Egyptian police to weaken Hamas, which has ruled over the strip since 2007.

Rafah’s opening would be a violation of an agreement reached in 2005 between the United States, Israel, Egypt, and the European Union, which gives EU monitors access to the crossing. The monitors were to reassure Israel that weapons and militants wouldn’t get into Gaza after its pullout from the territory in the fall of 2005.

Before Egypt’s uprising and ousting of longtime leader Hosni Mubarak, the border between Egypt and Gaza had been sealed. It has occasionally opened the passage for limited periods.